Do you want a highly effective Facebook page?
Do you know which elements make up a good Facebook page?
While there are an unlimited number of strategic factors that can contribute to the success of a Facebook page, many share common elements.
In this article I will share the six elements of successful Facebook pages and how you can improve your Facebook page.
#1: Add a Clear Cover Photo
When Facebook users land on your page, you want them to figure out who you are and what you do in about 3 seconds. That’s why a good cover photo is important.
Thankfully, Facebook has seriously relaxed the rules regarding cover photos. The current guidelines are the only rules to date (these are subject to change):
- All cover images are public. This means that anyone who visits your page will be able to see your cover image.
- Covers should not be deceptive, misleading or infringe on anyone else’s copyright.
- You may not encourage people to upload your cover to their personal timelines.
The 20% text rule doesn’t apply to cover images, so there’s no restriction on including prices or calls to action. Even so, I advise against filling your cover full of unneeded text. The simpler, the better.
Tips for Cover Images
Make sure your cover images are high quality. Use an image that is at least 851 x 315 pixels. Facebook will expand any image that is smaller than these dimensions and that will make your cover blurry.
Only use images and text that relate to your brand, services or products. For example, if you sell boats, don’t use images of trucks.
Toavoid a stale page appearance, change your cover in conjunction with the seasons, holidays or events that make sense for your brand.
If you don’t have professional image editing software, here are some free and paid tools to help you create a great cover image:
#2: Optimize Your Profile Photo
While your cover photo gives users who land on your Facebook page their first impression, it’s your profile photo they will see the most.
Unless they visit your timeline again, all they will see from you branding-wise is your profile photo on the news feed.
Your profile pic is more important than the cover photo because it appears in:
- The news feed of your followers
- Posts on your page’s timeline
- Replies in comments
- Comments and posts you make on other pages while using your page
- Over the cover photo on your timeline
Tips for Profile Pics
Rectangular images must be cropped as square to upload as a profile pic so it’s best to use a square image.
Your profile pic is uploaded at 180 x 180 pixels, but displayed at 160 x 160 pixels. Check to make sure the smaller image still looks good.
As the news feed of your followers is the highest visibility for your profile pic, you should design your profile pic for that location; profile pics are resized to 100 x 100 pixels in a fan’s news feed, to 86 x 86 pixels next to posts on your timeline, and 43 x 43 pixels next to comments. Again, check to make sure your image is recognizable at news feed or timeline location.
#3: Complete Your About Section
An incomplete or mis-configured About section could result in missed traffic and likes on your page.
Be aware that this section will look slightly different, depending on the category you choose when you create your page.
If you don’t have a physical location or it’s not common for people to come to your place of business, select a category such as “Company” or “Brand” when you create your page.
Choosing either of these options lets Facebook show your short description under the profile pic on your timeline. And that description can include a hyperlink to your website!
Tips for Your Short Description
Regardless of the category you choose during page setup, you should complete every field you can because portions of the About section show up under the profile pic on your timeline for desktop viewers.
To edit the short description for company or brand pages, click on Edit Page in the admin panel, and then Update Page Info. From here, click on the pencil icon next to Short Description.
Type in your URL at the beginning, so it’s the first thing people see.
You get 155 characters to tell people who you are, but I recommend using no more than 100; be clear and concise, and don’t stuff in keywords.
#4: Optimize for Mobile Views
Sometimes the About section shows differently on the Facebook mobile app than it does on the desktop.
I suggest making sure your Short Description, Mission and Company Overview all begin with your URL so it shows first when someone visits your page on a mobile device.
Be sure to see how your page shows on all mobile devices.
#5: Leverage Third-Party Page Apps
Some people argue that third-party apps on Facebook pages are useless since Facebook doesn’t allow a default landing page and because app tabs aren’t shown when viewing a page on the mobile app.
But apps can be used to support a wide variety of goals.
Tips for Third-Party App Use
Let people sign up for your newsletter without leaving Facebook.
Collect more email addresses by using a contest app to give users an incentive to enter their email address in exchange for the chance to win a prize.
Cross-promote your other social channels by using an app to include content from Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, etc..
There are a wide variety of app providers to choose from and almost all offer free plans with pre-made templates, so even non-tech–oriented people can install them with ease.
Here are a few for you to check out:
#6: Work From a Posting Strategy
The most important element of a successful Facebook page is a well-planned posting strategy.
You can have the prettiest cover photo and profile image, the most well-crafted About section and tons of amazing apps, but if your posting strategy lacks direction, you’re dead in the water!
Recent changes to the news feed algorithm mean you need to post more often to stay top of mind with your followers and get the most engagement. I recommend that pages publish three types of posts every day on their pages:
- Photo
- Text update
- Links
Tips for Photo Posts
For the most part, stay relevant to your followers. If you’re running a page about real estate, an image of Miley Cyrus makes no sense, but images of amazing homes, holiday spots and pictures of your town do make sense.
Tips for Text Update Posts
Due to the changes described in Facebook’s latest announcement, text-only updates are reaching fewer people than before:
“Through testing, we have found that when people see more text status updates on Facebook they write more status updates themselves. Over time, we noticed that this effect wasn’t true for text status updates from Pages…The latest update to News Feed ranking treats text status updates from Pages as a different category to text status updates from friends…posts from Pages behave differently to posts from friends and we are working to improve our ranking algorithms so that we do a better job of differentiating between the two types. This will help us show people more content they want to see. Page admins can expect a decrease in the distribution of their text status updates…”
To increase text post engagement, use questions or fill-in-the blank updates that are easy for people to respond to.
Mix in text updates that require a short response from users in the comments.
Tips for Post Links
A business on Facebook should never put all of its stock in getting lots of likes, comments and shares with text and photo posts.
The real value is found in posts that drive traffic to your website that turns to sales or conversions. Once there, users can read your article, sign up for your newsletter or purchase a product.
Make link posts the focus of your posting strategy and you should be highly successful.
Include a well-crafted call to action that supports that goal to get people to click and go to your blog or website landing page.
Make sure your landing page has a great image, because link posts now show a full-width photo preview on the news feed, which makes them look like photo posts.
Use a trackable URL from a service like bit.ly or Pretty Link so you can easily measure the click-through rate from Facebook.
In Conclusion
On a scale of 1-10 (10 being awesome) how would you rate your page? Is there room for improvement?
Use the tips above to make sure your page has the five elements of a successful Facebook page.
Create a clear cover photo, design a profile pic that scales well visually, and display your URL in your page’s About section. Next, add tactical functionality to your page with third-party apps and guide your page posting with a defined strategy.